Tag Archives: Petri dish

Yesterday morning we drove out to the Oak Brook office for the retrieval. We were due out there at 10:15, and I couldn’t eat or drink anything after midnight….so we stopped for bagels on the way out to have a snack ready to nosh. If 2 IVFs have taught me anything, it’s that I’m gonna be friggin hungry once they give me the green light to eat post anesthesia. The clinic gives me some ginger ale and animal crackers post retrieval while the rest of the IV gets me hydrated, but that just takes the edge off. Since there’s already going to be grogginess and crampiness in play, why put some food crankies in there as well? Plan ahead: have snacks at the ready.

Oh, one thing that was different this time – I got a second shot of pregnyl about 20-30 minutes before the retrieval. My RE wanted to use this as it may help with egg quality. It’s one more shot….at this point I just lift up my gown and bend over.

As I’m now recognized by the staff, there was a pretty relaxed atmosphere with me and a general silliness. The guy putting in my IV, my husband and I ended up coming up with a pretty good idea for a children’s book based on someone called Lumpy Bumpy and the woman trying to take my temp and blood pressure kept saying my fingers were way too cold….which led to questions of just how cold: “mortuary cold?”….”zombie cold?” The Russian popped her head in and said she felt pretty good about the cycle and that it was time to get going.

I got in the room, we went over making sure it was me in the room and then I took a snooze.

I woke up in the chair back in the prep/recovery area. My husband told me that The Russian had come in to say that they’d gotten 5 eggs. 5. We’d all hoped for more…..The Russian thought there’d be more. But we got 5, which is better than none.

Interesting point of coincidence: last night we also attended an open house at another adoption agency here in Chicago (couldn’t go in November, didn’t want to wait until January) so I like to think the universe is telling us: somehow folks….one way or another….this is going to work out for you guys.

Which leads us to today and the fertilization report – which I like to think comes after a night of petri dish partying: some sexy culture medium, an egg, a sperm, some romantic lighting, a glass of bubbly, a little Barry White…. Of the 5 eggs, 3 were mature and all three fertilized (we also had ICSI working for us, so no doubt that helped). Would I have liked all 5 to have fertilized? Sure. However, given my track record and age, I didn’t really think that was realistic, so I’m very happy with 3.

Now we wait to hear from The Russian (who will be talking to the embryologist sometime today) and she’ll let us know if we’re looking at a 3day (Saturday) or a 5day(Monday) transfer.

Two things I like/find intriguing:

1) Yesterday, the date was 11/12/13 (if you follow the European: date/month/year method…which for these purposes I will) – that’s as cool a day as any to have your petri dish party (and really, knowing the actual date of conception is at least one cool thing we get with IVF, right?).